Every spring, we are fortunate enough to be able to collect tadpoles from a pond on one of our staff members properties. The children are able to observe them grow and go through their metamorphosis, a concept much better understood if observed first hand. Once all of our tadpoles have turned into little frogs, we discuss the importance of returning them to their pond with the children. Then we bid them farewell, and Vicky takes them back home. At the moment our froglets are residing with me, as currently, we are on term break. So the children will be very pleased to see their progress when they return to preschool. I will present a post about our REAL tadpoles/frogs when they have completed their metamorphosis.
But in the mean time, I have this idea for you! While we are keeping track of our tadpoles, we also incubate and hatch chicken eggs (yet another post to follow, I am going to be busy!). One day I was trying to explain to a small group of children the difference between a chicken egg and a frog’s egg. I suggested that the frog’s egg was “jelly-like”, which seemed to result in a few puzzled facial expressions from the children. Reflecting on this later, I had a bit of a brain wave. “Aqua Gems”, perfect! While not quite to scale, they do give a good representation of what frogs eggs may feel and look like. So, I set up two of these little tubs.
Well, I can’t begin to tell you how popular they were! Each tub contained: some aqua gems, ‘blue’ water, tadpoles at various stages of their cycle, a young frog, an adult frog, a lily pad and a duck! The duck was added to the tub so that we could instigate some discussion about predators and the dangers facing tadpoles in their journey towards maturity.
By the end of each day, the aqua gems had turned to mush. As you can probably imagine, it is very tempting to squish them! Much like popping bubble wrap, once you start, you can’t stop!
If you look to the top of this picture, you may notice a booklet on the table where the children are playing. I often make up such booklets from pictures I find on “Google Images”. This one has large photo’s depicting the various stages of the frog life cycle. I laminate the pages and then comb-bind them. This means, you can have them lying around near water and they can just be wiped down later on. Too easy! It also means you can get exactly what you want, without having to seek out and pay lots of dollars for a similar reference.
Stay tuned, and I will update you on the REAL THING soon! 🙂
